Mid-Week Update

Here my mid weeks blog for ya'll. Let's see what's happened this week so far...

Yesterday, I had my Bodies and Burials "on site" class which was pretty neat, except for walking across the whole city of Rome on an empty stomach. We met at 9am at Piazza San Giovanni, which is very far from my apartment, I had to leave at 8am and I still got there 5 minutes late. But after transferring between the tram and two different buses, I finally got there. We first walked down to the old Roman walls on the south east side of the city to look at an old free mans tomb from Roman times. As Rome expanded over time, the tomb became part of the city wall and aquaduct which was a neat sight to see. The circle shapes are supposed to imitate bread ovens, because the guy buried there is a baker, cool right? Oh and the other half got destroyed in the medieval ages when it was used as a fort tower..

Then we walked to the nearby Santa Croce in Gerusalemme which houses relics that Saint Helen brought back from the Holy Land, after her son, Emperor Constantine, became Christian. (see previous blog to learn all about Constantine). Among the relics she brought back, that are now on display in the church, are pieces of wood from the true cross, thorns from the crown that Jesus wore, the finger of St Thomas (which he used to touch Jesus' womb after his resurrection because he did not believe it was actually him) and the sign that was on top of the cross (all in picture on the right)-->

Combining seeing those with seeing the bones of St. Peter last Friday, I've definitely gotten a good dose of holy relics this week. To add to that, we took a short walk over to San Giovanni di Laterano where they have the skulls of St. John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist resting above the altar. San Giovanni also used to be the head of the Church up until the 14th century when St. Peter's Basilica took on that role because of two fires that severely damaged it. Also neat fact, outside of it, stands the worlds biggest obelisk. Obelisks were placed in front of many churches in Rome as markers for people coming to Rome as a pilgrimage. You can start there at the south of Rome at San Giovanni and literally follow the obelisks up through Rome to hit all of the pilgrimage sites.The reason all these older churches were down towards the old city walls and limits was for two reasons. One was because Constantine himself owned much of this land by the city limits and donated it to the church upon his death and the second was because as Rome was still dominantly pagan even in his time, it was safer to put the churches farther away from the downtown area.

Mausoleum of Augustus

After that, we went and saw another thing that Saint Helen brought back, which was the steps from Pontius Pilate's residence that Jesus walked up when he was summoned to see him. There were many pilgrims there going up each step on their knees like tradition tells to. After that we went to the Trajan Forum, next to the Roman Forum where we saw the Trajan Column which has his remains inside of it. That marked the first time an emperor (or anyone else that is) had been buried within the city. After, we made our way up Via Del Corso to the Mausoleum of Augustus where class finally ended. If you were expecting to see something more extravagant for one of Rome's greatest emperors then you can thank all the people who robbed and destroyed it over time. Sooo much walking but definitely worth it, saw a ton of neat things.

So that was my Tuesday morning from 9am til Noon. Nothing else really happened yesterday worth noting, except that I had an incredible pizza for lunch; like really really good.

So today, Ash Wednesday, I had plans to go to St. Peter's for mass and ashes. On their website it said that they'd be doing masses all day on the hour and then giving ashes out separately all day in the chapel. So, I went over with the expectation that I'd be able to attend mass then get ashes before having to be at school at 5:15 for my Italian test. Well turns out the website was wrong. When I got there, they said ashes were only in the morning and there were no more masses except at 5 o'clock (complete opposite of what their website said). So I walked around the basilica for awhile asking different attendants and got the run around, kept being sent to different parts of the church, which was neat in itself though because I got to see a lot of parts of the church that are normally restricted but then it was also a let down that I couldn't do mass or get my ashes. Since I didn't have time to go anywhere else at that point I decided to stay there for a bit, go to confession, and hang out a bit in the square (it was a beautiful day out) then get back to AUR for my Italian test (which was very hard). Part of the test was knowing when to use who, whom, to whom etc..that kind of stuff. I don't know how to use that stuff in English much less Italian but whatever, spring break is next week! - Canaries here I come!

One cool thing today was that at St. Peter's today, an older couple came up to me asking when mass started. So I responded back to them in Italian just as they had talked to me in, and went on explaining that I wasn't sure but I think there is one at 5pm but I told them to go over and ask one of the attendants blah blah. Well they got a confused look over their faces and the wife whispered to the husband, in English, "I didn't understand any of that." So then they asked me if I by any chance spoke a little English..I said, yes, I speak a little, grinned and explained it to them in English. Now I know there's not much to be proud of in the fact that I fooled older American tourists into thinking I was actually Italian, but I was feeling pretty proud of myself :) It's cool cultural things like that that make feel like I'm starting to belong here. Also, this afternoon, I knew where to take the tram to, what bus stop to walk to from there and what bus line to take to get to St Peters without even having to look it up on atac.com (a site which is pretty much mapquest except you put in your start and finish point and it tells you what public transportation to take - really useful!). Double immersion points for me today! #Winning Speaking of winning, for the first time in over a week, the phrases #winning, #tigerblood and Charlie Sheen are no longer trending on Twitter, which is sad, I think? And if you haven't watched Sheen's Corner, it's a must see! Just my opinion though..

Maria gets here Saturday! Spending the weekend in Florence with her and getting back just in time Monday afternoon for my Italian mid term, booo. But, I'm now just 4 mid terms away from spring break 2011! Also, we're taking a class field trip Saturday morning to some new cave that was just opened up to the public for my 'Bodies and Burials' class to check out some dead skeletons and such, should be fun! ha

Oh, and my roommate just brought home a dog. Her name is Carly Sheen.